When your customers love your beer and brewery, they want to help build your brand! They want to be able to share your brewery with their friends and family. In today’s world of Social Media it is VERY simple for them to do that as long as you have the right strategies in place. Remember it is more than just posting onto Facebook and Twitter, it is about getting your hands dirty and letting those that love your brewery get involved in the process!

3 Tips to build your “Online Beer Brand”

Tell Your Story: Behind each great brewery there is a unique story to be told! For example Sam Adam’s founder Jim Koch fondly tells his story on the back of the Boston Lager six pack. He found his grandfather’s lager recipe in his fathers attic, brewed the first batch it in his kitchen, and with a little tweaking, Boston Lager was born. The rest is history, with the creation of Boston Lager Jim Koch began the highly successful Sam Adams Brewery. Through that story they were able to build “trust” amnugst their fans! This is KEY, once you have told your story and built that trust you have a loyal customer for life!

Create a Clear Identity: Your image embodies your brand. The reason why craft beer is so fascinating is that each has a unique identity. Craft your identity using traits you feel closely align with your personal brand. Remember, once your image has been set out into the world, it can be hard to change or retract it. Your identity should show something about your story!

Stay the Course: Once you begin the branding process, stay consistent throughout social media, websites, marketing materials etc. You do this so your customers and potential customers will recognize who you are and already have an idea what you are about. Without consistency, your brand will seize to exist. Along those lines of being consistent you also must be able to make adjustments. You may want to update website images, and social media images as needed, still staying consistent with your brand! To find out which areas of your branding campaign may need adjustment, talk to your customers and monitor your brand!

Follow these three steps and your brand will continue to remain true and your core values will shine through! Your craft beer brand will thrive!!! There are so many opportunities out there for craft breweries to be able to thrive online and build an amazing online and offline community. We would love to help your brewery with their online marketing strategy! Please call us today for a FREE 1 hour consultation and strategy session (720)338-6996 or email Marketing@TheBIMSTeam.com we look forward to working with you soon!

Generating leads for your business is not an easy task. It requires a lot of work. If it would make you feel better, we’d want to let you know that there is a ton of other marketers who are also struggling with the same troubles.

In this article, we have rounded up some of the most common lead generation problems along with the solutions to help you get things rolling in the right direction. Read on and we’ll tell you more about it.

Low traffic

Your ability to produce a steady stream of traffic is important as it affects your ability to turn visitors into leads and leads into paying customers.

If your traffic is leveling off, then optimization is necessary. That being said, you might want to conduct keyword research. On-page SEO practices like the use of keywords in your title tags, headers, meta-description, links and URL will help you boost your search engine results ranking.

Unqualified leads

Producing tons of leads is great, but it’s the quality of incoming leads that will influence the success of your business.

The best way of addressing unqualified leads can only be summed up in 2 words: buyer personas. In order to capture the right leads, you first have to determine your target audience and capture their attention.

Tight budget

If you think lead generation is challenging, it could be even more challenging if you are working on a tight budget. When the money tree shrivels up, you should have a plan in place in order to sustain lead generation.

If you are focusing on traditional methods or PPC, we’re not surprised why you are sweating profusely. Well, we’re not insinuating that inbound marketing is free, but there are a lot of methods that you can use without sucking up your entire budget.

Lead generation doesn’t always have to be costly. This is especially true if you think smarter, not harder.

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So you’re a small business. That means you probably don’t have the budget to run with the big dogs of social media. AKA – stop trying to keep up with Starbucks. If you do not have the budget to giveaway the latest IPad – don’t do it. Offer a prize your company can handle such as a service, discount, or small product. This also means that the participants in your giveaway are likely to be interested in your company, and not just in it for the free Ipad.

You have probably already picked up on the fact that there is no physical cost to join social media. As a small business, marketing without fees probably sounds like the best kind. But don’t be fooled – social media marketing is anything but free. Doing it right requires serious man-hours. The commitment to social media is unrelenting and endless. Engaging with followers and sharing valuable content is a full time job.

Most small businesses feel a sense of urgency to get onto social media because of the tidal wave big brands have made on all social media platforms. Focus on your social media goals. Whatever they are, the bottom line should be to build relationships and grow customer trust. That means that social media is not the place to display your promotional copy. Get rid of anything remotely resembling a “BUY ME” button. Social media is about social engagement. Think of yourself in a social situation – do you spend the entire time talking about yourself? Hopefully the answer is no. This type of etiquette applies to social media as well. Just as you would in a social environment, strive to be interesting on social media. Post content that gives your followers or friends something to react too. If someone were to walk up to you and give you a compliment or ask you a question, you would never just ignore it. You would acknowledge it with a “thank you” or a reply. The same thing should be done on your social media platforms.

As a small business, you do not need to be present on every social media account. If you use Facebook over Google +, it does not mean you are a social media failure. The biggest error you could make is to have a Google + account that is completely neglected and shows inconsistent activity. It is better to have one or two active and up to date social media accounts than have five accounts that are not receiving adequate time and management.

Avoiding these social media mistakes small businesses tend to make is crucial to your success. Be the small business that gets social media right!

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Is your company excited about the holidays? Does that show on your social media?

December is already here, that means people are gearing up for the holiday season. This season is a great opportunity to adopt new social media tactics – with a holiday twist. People are already spending time on social media sites, and are getting excited about the holidays. So why not get people excited about the holidays and involved in your company at the same time?

Give your followers another reason to engage with your company this holiday season.

Start a Facebook Holiday themed promotion. There are several ways to do this. Consider a limited-time-only discount, supporting a charity, or giving a gift back to loyal customers. All of these promotions are ways to add a little something extra to your company’s Facebook effort.

Promote a holiday-themed hashtag on Instagram. Encourage followers to upload holiday pictures using the hashtag, or pictures that are relevant to your brand. Make it a contest and award the contestant with the most “Likes” a holiday gift. Make it easy for fans to enter the contest by just simply using the hashtag. Once a winner is selected, contact them to claim their prize through their social media account.

Start a New Years countdown, asking users to share their resolutions. Try to think of ways your business could be part of a New Years Resolution.

Host a gift giveaway that takes place between Christmas and New Years…this is sure to keep your fans in the holiday spirit!

Use Twitter to show your holiday enthusiasm and excitement! Be sure to tweet any other contests or giveaways you have started on your other social media accounts!

The holidays are about giving back, so do something different and thoughtful for your fan base – thank them for supporting your business all year. Even something small, like tweeting out holiday jokes, can put a smile on a customers face! The holiday season is known for love, happiness, and positive thoughts for the New Year – make sure to be a part of that when it comes to social media.

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Rewarding your customers is an essential component of driving customer loyalty. Foursquare, the leading location based social network, offers a great medium to connect your offline and online audience. Foursquare allows users to check into locations on their mobile phones. Then, users can share that location with friends on other social media platforms, such as Twitter and Facebook. Your company can benefit from these check-ins. When users’ friends see where they are checking in to eat and shop, they are more likely to follow suit to eat and shop there too!

Your goal on Foursquare should be to connect your customer’s online habits and offline habits. You can do this by offering deals and specials on Foursquare. Use specials to attract new customers, and reward loyal existing ones. Personalize your rewards to your customer. For example, to reward a first-time customer, award them a free cookie on their first check in. To reward a frequent customer, offer them 10% off their bill every third check in. Use a combination of different specials to encourage a growing clientele and satisfy returning customers.

Make it easy for your customers to check in. You’ve already gotten people in the door, now its time to make sure you capitalize on that. You must claim your business’s location! Make sure to claim ownership of your physical location. If you do not see your business listed, you can access Foursquare from your mobile phone and select “Add this place”. Provide as much relevant information in your profile as possible – this will help inform your current and future customers.

Switch up the specials you offer and see what seems to appeal to customers most. Get to know your audience by running two specials at a time. This way you can see if your customer base are mostly returning customers or new customers. Treat your customers well with rewards – they will return the favor!

At this time of each year we think about what we accomplished over the last year – and what we want to improve on for the upcoming new year.

From a marketing perspective, it’s easy to get overwhelmed with all new ideas and bright shiny objects out there to pull our attention away from the marketing strategies that matter most – those that will actually improve your business and expand your marketing reach.

So, in honor of the new year – I present to you the 12 best online marketing strategies to focus on for 2012. There could be more – but these are in my opinion the best strategies to bring you quicker to your business goals using online marketing strategies that work.

Don’t choose them all! Focus on the 2 or 3 that you feel could impact your marketing effort the most – and carve out the time and plan for implementing them next year!

1. Improve your irresistible free offer. Perhaps it’s time to replace that outdated “free report” or “eBook” with an even higher value freebie to offer site visitors. As I referred to in my post about the best freebie out there – my favorite is still the Audio CD – which has huge intrinsic value because it’s a physical “thing” and you can capture mailing addresses in addition to just email address.

2. Launch a new product or program. There is always something you can “launch” whether it’s a new product or program. You can also “re-launch” something you did this year that performed really well. My post shares some great methods for launching a new product or program. Think about what you can do differently this time around to make it even more engaging and worthwhile for your audience. Add more bonuses and juicier incentives to help increase sales.

3. Do a new webinar or teleseminar. Each new year is a great time to host a new topic using either a webinar or teleseminar. It can also be a perfect time to switch up the format and see what works best. Been doing a bunch of teleseminars lately? Try a webinar? Doing just webinars? Try a teleseminar. And, choose a topic that is new to your audience and see what kind of response you receive.

4. Connect with a new joint venture partner. Have this year be the year you establish a great partnership with a new strategic alliance or joint venture partner. I explained how to do this in my post about joint venture as a great list building strategy. Someone that you feel can really pull you and help you in a big way – while you can do the same for them. I always like to think outside the box about who to connect with – and expect something great as a result.

5. Create an affiliate program. Perhaps this is the year you launch an affiliate program. Affiliates are a great way to spread your message and build your list – while also supporting your sales of products or programs. Pretty much most shopping cart programs support affiliate programs and are easy to establish.

6. Update your website / blog. Website looking a bit outdated? Perhaps it’s time to hire a graphic designer for that new logo you’ve been craving or hire a website developer to update your entire site. I shared how important design is when it comes to marketing online in an earlier post so don’t skimp on the important details when updating your website. First impressions matter most when designing your website.

7. Be more active on social media. Are you one of the folks who has a Twitter account but hardly ever uses it? Perhaps you’re wondering exactly what to post on that new Facebook fanpage you created? Have this year be the year you be more “social” on social media. Remember, you can’t be active on these social media sites unless you show up and do the work.

8. Start a pay-per-click advertising campaign. I’m a huge fan of pay-per-click advertising. One of my earlier posts about PPC explains that it’s one of the best and most effective ways to quickly and authentically build your list with highly qualified leads. Whether it’s Google AdWords or Facebook ads – they convert brand new prospects onto your list and you can target very specific groups of people searching what you have to offer. Yes, you gotta pay for the traffic – but – it’s definitely worth it on the long run.

9. Add video to your marketing. It’s 2012 and you’re still not using video in your online marketing? It’s time to jump onboard with the most powerful and effective way to connect and build trust online with visitors to your site. With the advances of technology and video equipment costs plummeting – you really have no excuse to do more video and start reaping the benefits immediately.

10. Generate more content. Only posting to your blog once every other week or once a month? This is the year you need to generate a ton more content – way more than you’re even doing now (unless you blog every single day.) Putting out high-content and high-value articles and blog posts is how you get new traffic as well as nurture the existing audience you have on your list. Content is king.

11. Be smart about SEO. Still don’t have a clue about search engine optimization or how it relates to your blog or website? SEO is critical for having massive success online – and can’t be ignored or overlooked anymore. Develop a comprehensive SEO strategy about how to improve your search engine rankings for your best keywords and let’s get to work.

12. Email your list more often. Only sending the email newsletter out when you have the time for it? This is the year we get you on a consistent and frequent schedule of emailing your list all this great content you’re now generating. If you’re doing monthly now – consider bi-weekly. Sending the newsletter every other week? Let’s make it happen by sending it weekly. The more you email your list – the higher your open rates and consumption of your content – which is all good.

There you have it! The official 12 best marketing strategies to grow your business with online marketing for 2012.

Social media marketing is a bear! It can feel like you are posting all day and no one is commenting or even listening. Don’t let a lack of comments get you down, you never know who might be out there watching and not talking.

The picture that I have on this post was taken out front of my house with an iPhone and the app TruHDR (one of my faves). I noticed when I got inside that I had my thumb in the picture – doh! If I was “smart” I would have cropped it out and had a “good” picture to post (most of our clients want everything to be perfect). What I did was post it to my Facebook with the comment, “they are paving the road! and my thumb…:)”. I got 7 comments and a couple of likes. Social media is about being human and humans are not always scripted and perfect.

This goes for companies too! When Dominos Pizza started losing market share, they did not curl up and die, they said that they would have to change their sauce and the quality of their pizza and sales rose. Many small biz owners are SO concerned that they look perfect that they become bland and boring! Snazzy it up a bit! If you would like to find out about other companies who have admitted to being less than perfect, check out the Washington Post’s, Behind Domino’s mea culpa ad campaign.

Does It Matter How Many Comments You Get?

Getting blog comments and getting social media comments follow the same formula as all regular human interaction. There is research from 2006 that shows this perfectly (and given that the stats haven’t changed in the intervening years, tend to be pretty compelling). According to Jakob Nielsen,

In most online communities, 90% of users are lurkers who never contribute, 9% of users contribute a little, and 1% of users account for almost all the action.

So think about that, for each commenter you have on one of your posts, there are potentially 90 people who will see it and never comment, BUT they saw it none-the-less! This is why you will go to a party and have someone you have never heard of say, “I am your Facebook friend” or “I see you on Google Plus all the time”. They see YOU and what you are doing, whether they talk to you online or not!

Funniest part of the Participation Inequality post was, “How to Overcome Participation Inequality – You can’t.” You can’t make people comment if they don’t want to, you can only post things that ENCOURAGE commenting and hope that someone jumps in to get the ball rolling.

Additionally, (I promise I will get to ideas of what to post to get comments soon), you need to be aware of WHEN you are posting things and who might be online at the time. If you are a nightbird and posting all your “stuff” at midnight, it may be pushed down everyone’s wall by the time they get up, OR you may have a hoard of people who are all up in the middle of the night with you who jump in to comment because there is not all that much else going on.

Timezones and posting matter too! If you are trying to target overseas customers, working on Eastern time won’t cut it. You are going to have to do some posting and commenting when it is mid morning and early evening THEIR time. Test this and see if it makes a difference in how many comments you get!

Social Media Ideas – What To Post To Get Comments On Your Posts

If you skipped down here, go up and read the rest, we will wait for you..:)

Personal items – The people working on the street outside my house are not inherently interesting, BUT it shows that I do not talk about marketing and small business all the time! It makes me more of a person and less of a company. I would say if you use social media for business that you should not talk about your baby, dog, husband, girlfriend or any other super personal thing TOO MUCH but that doesn’t mean that you can never talk about them! One guy who really gets this right is Daniel Webster Johnson. He is a Colorado Realtor who traipses around every morning taking pretty pictures of the Colorado countryside and his dog. It REALLY works for him!

Quotations – Now please note, these should only be quotations that have meaning to you. Just popping something up there everyday with no background as to why it is interesting is not that great a practive. I like quotationspage.com for quotes, the search engine is good and they have LOTS! Another good things to do is make up your own quotes – one fellow, Imran Rahman, has Imranisms. It always gives me a chuckle to see what he has posted!

Selling With People – You CAN sell if you are giving credit to other people at the same time! Kirsten McKay Smith is especially good at it on her Passion Rockstars pagewhich is a clearinghouse for her to talk to her team (and people who follow it may also want to become a member of her team after seeing how neat she is!)

Great Links From Your Industry– I am always looking for new things that could help my clients increase traffic or get more clients. Frequently I find good resources that I share with my online community. I also save these for my newsletter so they do double duty!

Post your videos– people like to see interesting things and if you can pop out a quicky video about your industry or a topic that will appeal to everyone, you can get some good interaction. Remember to be QUICK! 2 minutes or less.

Things from your past that are interesting– Could be reference to Woodstock from our baby boomer friends or a really great Muppet Movie clip. Just make sure you let us know WHY it is important to you!

Open Ended Questions – Ask your friends and circles an INTERESTING question that does not work with a yes or no answer. According to Buddy Media, Posts that END with a question (rather than having it at the beginning or middle) have a 15% higher engagement rate.

Trending topics – It is okay to comment on current events, I just make sure to stay out of religion and politics. Just think, if you are PRO REPUBLICAN or PRO DEMOCRAT, you are effectively alienating about half of the rest of your customers. I had a funny thing happen the other day, a fellow who was selling insurance threw out the term “Obamacare” and giggled like it was stupid. I can tell you, he DID NOT KNOW that would be offensive to some people in the room who would then choose someone else to work with. I KNOW, some people like to be very partisan on their social media and that is their choice. As a small business owner, I cannot afford to lose that many potential new clients. Nuff said.

The NUMBER ONE Most Important Social Media Commenting Idea!

Talk back. That is right, if you get one comment, talk back. If you get two, talk back again. People are more apt to interact with your posts if they know that there is a real person on the other side! If someone posts something nice on your wall, thank them. In general, just interact as you would with plain old humans you would come into contact in your day-to-day life.

After doing some videos I realized that I was NOT posting them to my blog! I cannot believe I did not do that. So I wanted to share with you a few videos that I have done to help you with your Internet Marketing. If you need help in any of these areas or have questions please feel free to contact me. Enjoy!

What is a niche? A niche is a portion of the market that is not being addressed adequately. You must identify the niche that you are targeting so that you are able to focus your work properly. There are a few reasons why niche marketing is important that you must understand before you get started. The main thing about marketing online is to be prepared before you get going. Preparation is vital because it can take you from your dream to a reality.

1. If you get started with internet marketing and do not select a specific niche then you will likely lose your goal along the way. It is like going into something blindly and that just does not turn out well. You must know who you are targeting and what portion of the market is not being targeted already. If you go after a segment of the market that has a lot of competition then your likelihood of making a lot of money is very low.

2. Niche marketing is also important for your search engine optimization needs. SEO is a very important process and you must know what niche you are targeting so that you can use the proper keywords and carry out the process correctly. If search engine optimization is not carried out appropriately then your goals will not be fulfilled. Take some time to put some thought into this before you get started.

3. The best thing about niche marketing is that it provides you with a direction along your internet marketing process. It feels so much better when you have a direction. For some, niche marketing seems like such a simple part of the plan but it may not always be so obvious for everyone. No matter who you are, it is always helpful to have a direction and in this case, if you do not have a direction with your niche then you will fall off your path very easily.

Niche marketing is vital for many reasons. Take a look at a few of these reasons and learn to implement the ideas throughout your own internet marketing process.

If you have stepped into the world of internet marketing even slightly, you have probably heard the term search engine optimization before. This is an essential process that you will need to take on throughout your journey as an online marketer. A question you may ask yourself is why this process is so important. There really are a few reasons that this process is both important and beneficial for your business both short term and long term. Once you understand these benefits you will be eager to get started.

1. Once you have a website set up for your business, your next step will be to complete the SEO for it. Before you can carry out this important step of your plan you need to fully understand it. SEO is a process by which you design the internal structure of your site appropriately so that it can be found easier by search engines and site visitors.

2. Some things to pay attention to when you are designing the internal structure of your site are keywords and phrases. This is how sites are ranked among search results so when you structure your keywords and phrases appropriately, you raise your likelihood of being found by search engine spiders much higher. Also, when you are creating your site you need to be sure your content is both relevant and of high quality. This is important because it sets you apart from the competition and builds credibility with site visitors.

3. A part of your plan will always be niche marketing. When focusing on your search engine optimization you must be targeting your specified niche market. This will become relevant because the people that want your goods and services will find you much quicker when you are focused on a specific part of the market.

If you have ever wondered about search engine optimization, it is a good thing that you took some time to read up about it. The more you understand about SEO the better off you will be with your business goals. In the long term, your financial success will soar like it never has before.

Hi There!

Welcome to the BIMS Team community! We are so excited that you’re checking out our site and resources. Our goal is to help you and your business succeed through digital marketing! Whether you are an established business, blogger, or entrepreneur, we know you’ll find information you need to get to the next level!